I enjoyed this talk very much. I think the older gentlemen's question regarding a core curriculum is particularly relevant. However, I felt that Dr. Faust's answer was woefully inadequate. Allowing students a breadth of options naively sounds like a good idea, but it turns out to be detrimental to most students' educations and development. Students entering college to study science are not wise enough to select good humanities courses which will challenge them, and students entering college to study the humanities are typically not confident enough in their own technical ability to study difficult STEM (proof-based mathematics, chemistry, biology, etc.). What ends up happening is that both sides end up defaulting to the easiest courses possible in fields besides their own. Moreover, the wide array of topics available is almost impossible to navigate coherently. My humanities courses in college consisted of: Microeconomics, central European cinema, Russian language, and a literature course on identity. While any one of those courses was decent, they are an incoherent mess when considered as a whole. Their total influence on me was definitely less than the sum of their parts. They did not impart in me all the intrinsic, purported benefits Dr. Faust is claiming the humanities have. Now that I am studying the humanities on my own free time, and working through the classics, I do agree in principle with her but disagree fervently with her approach. A majority of the talk was focused on how the humanities develop an intrinsic wisdom in the participant that other forms of intellectual engagement cannot provide. It is an uncomfortable reality that the quality of courses in most universities varies greatly. Selecting the best courses requires a certain amount of wisdom, maturity, and knowledge of what one seeks from a humanities education. All of this comes from the humanities, and so students are left to navigate the vast array of courses without the wisdom necessary to select appropriately. A rigid core curriculum is absolutely necessary to the development of most students. We need the structured approach because we are not wise enough to choose for ourselves.
Your points are well taken. There is TOO much emphasis on "specialized technical training", AND there is a great need for humanistic knowledge-as it used to be taught. What do I mean by the previous? Humanities was a Philosophical base composed of a Grammar, Logic and Rhetorical foundation. Afterwards, it was all the mathematical components like Physics,Chemistry,Biology and Math. As an example, one of our chemical engineers, had the Logical knowledge to design and implement an operational protocol and procedure for our power plant in PR. He had taken basic Humanities BEFORE becoming an engineer including logic and languages and was able to solve problems. So, I agree, the Humanities has inestimable value which you don't see until later in life. You need both areas to avoid engineers who can't write or judges and lawyers who know nothing of Science. Regards
@@raymondfrye5017 Aren't you speaking more to Liberal Arts than Humanities? I always thought that logic, rhetoric and grammer was the basis for Liberal Arts. It seems many people tend to conflate the two and it creates more confusion as to what we are talking about. I am open to being the one that is confused instead.
When I started school in the Seventies, here in Puerto Rico, many of the professors were European,Hindu and Chinese. They taught their courses as they do in Europe or the East. It was they who explained to me that Humanities used to be subdivided into two branches: Trivium and Quadrivium. They were separated at the turn of the Twentieth Century. The Trivium corresponds to what the US calls Liberal Arts and the Quadrivium to Sciences or STEM. Both,together, comprise the Humanities. The former takes 4 years and the latter takes 3 years. So, what I took was all the Arts requirements for three years and then the Sciences requirements later, for two and a half years. Strangely enough, it was the Arts that helped me out the most later in life. I'm getting off-track here so I will cut it short. Regards
@@raymondfrye5017 Nah I actually like how you broke that down and I never knew that humanities was both. Thank you for expounding on that? Why do you think the split happened and why aren't there schools like that anymore? As a Philosophy major it is quite annoying seeing both Trivium and Quadrivium going at it all the time and making things a political war ground. I just wish I could go somewhere where I can just learn about everything. I really like the idea of 4 years Arts and 2 to 3 years of a science.
People spend their entire lives coming up with answers to these kinds of questions. An hour is extremely short for something like this. What's your answer to this "simple" question?
Beautiful talk.
The subscript says that this has been published on 01.07.2016. - It would be nice to see also the exact date for when the talk was held.
They spoke in Aspen on June 30, 2016, according to the Ideas Festival site
I enjoyed this talk very much. I think the older gentlemen's question regarding a core curriculum is particularly relevant. However, I felt that Dr. Faust's answer was woefully inadequate. Allowing students a breadth of options naively sounds like a good idea, but it turns out to be detrimental to most students' educations and development.
Students entering college to study science are not wise enough to select good humanities courses which will challenge them, and students entering college to study the humanities are typically not confident enough in their own technical ability to study difficult STEM (proof-based mathematics, chemistry, biology, etc.). What ends up happening is that both sides end up defaulting to the easiest courses possible in fields besides their own.
Moreover, the wide array of topics available is almost impossible to navigate coherently. My humanities courses in college consisted of: Microeconomics, central European cinema, Russian language, and a literature course on identity. While any one of those courses was decent, they are an incoherent mess when considered as a whole. Their total influence on me was definitely less than the sum of their parts. They did not impart in me all the intrinsic, purported benefits Dr. Faust is claiming the humanities have. Now that I am studying the humanities on my own free time, and working through the classics, I do agree in principle with her but disagree fervently with her approach.
A majority of the talk was focused on how the humanities develop an intrinsic wisdom in the participant that other forms of intellectual engagement cannot provide. It is an uncomfortable reality that the quality of courses in most universities varies greatly. Selecting the best courses requires a certain amount of wisdom, maturity, and knowledge of what one seeks from a humanities education. All of this comes from the humanities, and so students are left to navigate the vast array of courses without the wisdom necessary to select appropriately.
A rigid core curriculum is absolutely necessary to the development of most students. We need the structured approach because we are not wise enough to choose for ourselves.
Your points are well taken. There is TOO much emphasis on "specialized technical training", AND there is a great need for humanistic knowledge-as it used to be taught.
What do I mean by the previous? Humanities was a Philosophical base composed of a Grammar, Logic and Rhetorical foundation. Afterwards, it was all the mathematical components like Physics,Chemistry,Biology and Math.
As an example, one of our chemical engineers, had the Logical knowledge to design and implement an operational protocol and procedure for our power plant in PR. He had taken basic Humanities BEFORE becoming an engineer including logic and languages and was able to solve problems.
So, I agree, the Humanities has inestimable value which you don't see until later in life. You need both areas to avoid engineers who can't write or judges and lawyers who know nothing of Science.
Regards
@@raymondfrye5017 Aren't you speaking more to Liberal Arts than Humanities? I always thought that logic, rhetoric and grammer was the basis for Liberal Arts. It seems many people tend to conflate the two and it creates more confusion as to what we are talking about. I am open to being the one that is confused instead.
When I started school in the Seventies, here in Puerto Rico, many of the professors were European,Hindu and Chinese. They taught their courses as they do in Europe or the East. It was they who explained to me that Humanities used to be subdivided into two branches: Trivium and Quadrivium. They were separated at the turn of the Twentieth Century.
The Trivium corresponds to what the US calls Liberal Arts and the Quadrivium to Sciences or STEM. Both,together, comprise the Humanities. The former takes 4 years and the latter takes 3 years.
So, what I took was all the Arts requirements for three years and then the Sciences requirements later, for two and a half years. Strangely enough, it was the Arts that helped me out the most later in life.
I'm getting off-track here so I will cut it short.
Regards
@@raymondfrye5017 Nah I actually like how you broke that down and I never knew that humanities was both. Thank you for expounding on that? Why do you think the split happened and why aren't there schools like that anymore? As a Philosophy major it is quite annoying seeing both Trivium and Quadrivium going at it all the time and making things a political war ground. I just wish I could go somewhere where I can just learn about everything. I really like the idea of 4 years Arts and 2 to 3 years of a science.
@@_VISION. Well, Im not an expert on anything except maybe a wee bit of Chemistry and Math that I majored in.
I didn't watch the video, just why do you need more than an hour to answer that apparently quite simple question?
...
i know
People spend their entire lives coming up with answers to these kinds of questions. An hour is extremely short for something like this. What's your answer to this "simple" question?
@@electricupper he might be a utilitarian or he might think think the answer is simply, "of course"